"We book the best bands available at the time of booking taking gender balance into consideration, which can be challenging," she said.

"Whilst we have a very conscious and strong agenda to book female talent, it isn't always available to us at that headline level. We have a long-term strategy, which is present on this year's Falls line-up, of giving opportunities to new and middle range female Australian artists, to nurture and grow the future pool of female headline options. We support the core message of gender balance and have been working towards a more balanced line up at Falls.

"We have seen other bands who are passionate about this topic go out and start their own events where they have total control of the line-up, with great success and we applauded their initiative. Taking control yourself, is a great way to effect change."

"We are very fortunate to have such a unique festival culture here in Australia and there is no doubt that Australian festivals are in the spotlight for both positive and negative reasons, I feel like this gives us a huge opportunity to take action and make a global impact - setting a whole new precedent for festivals to tackle the issues and stand-up for the empowerment and safety of their artists, staff and attendees alike," Hellmrich wrote last November.